Thursday, June 15, 2006

A Tormented Jameel.

A few weeks back I was contacted by Steven Weiss about joining the Jewish Blogs ad network. I was flattered to be asked to join such a prestigious group of big name bloggers, including Canonist, Orthomom, DovBear, Serandez and others -- the whole idea had me tickled pink that someone would advertise on blogs, let alone mine!

If you notice the "Hamsa" graphic on the right-hand side of my blog, you'll see what I'm talking about...and clicking through it will lead you to the list of blogs associated with the JBlog ad network.

And then...yesterday...I was notified that someone wanted to place on ad on my blog!

Was I excited!

I danced around my office and immediately called the Mrs. @ The Muqata!

This was great...financial self sufficiency for an oleh like me? A dream come true!

It all came crashing down a few minutes ago when an email arrived from the Mrs:

To: JameelFrom: The Mrs.Date: Today, a few minutes ago.

Did you see what your ad is for??

Err, actually, not really. I just glanced at it -- it said something about a Jewish Comedy.

Come see the insanity that ensues when a Jewish daughter brings home her new Palestinian boyfriend!

Uh oh.

Would you advertise for anything? How about for cigarettes?

Oh man. Busted.

After criticizing religious newspapers for years for printing ads from cigarette companies, here I was, with an ad on "The Muqata" promoting...assimilation and intermarriage? A Jewish woman going out with a Palestinian?! I'm all in favor of coexistence, but intermarriage is OUT!

I can't take down the ad because it's contractually supposed to run for 2 weeks.

Having thought about the issue very seriously, I have come up with the following steps for all future ads (which I hope are many!)

1. I will only post ads for which I have read through their entire content.

2. I will post ads which do not conflict with my hashkafic outlook on life, conflict with halacha, or harm the interests of the Jewish People, Israel, or Aliya.

3. Under no circumstances will I ever again eat 7 slices of pizza on my way home from Ramat Beit Shemesh after meeting with my accountant, UNLESS I CALL MY WIFE FIRST. (more on that in the upcoming post).

Look, I hope this movie doesn't actually advocate assimilation. It could be funny...

I sincerely apologize in advance if anyone is offended by the ad.

In any event I hope that by the end of the movie, the Jewish woman breaks up with her Palestinian boyfriend, returns to the Derech, marries her true bashert, makes aliya, has healthy and happy kids, and starts a successful aliya advocacy blog.

Then again, she could make aliya first and find her bashert here in Israel -- the order doesn't really matter.

Seven slices?! I couldn't eat that much if I tried! Even just four or five would make me sick to my stomach. But then again, I'm female...

I saw the ad, and I thought, "huh, that's strange" but I figured that maybe you didn't have a say about what ads ran on your blog if you signed up for the network. Oh well, you've learned from your mistake.

Sarah: YES, I will definitely mention that to them the next time I'm there. Or maybe, just make that message an integral part of my wallet.

Scraps: I haven't eaten so much in years...but to tell you the truth, I didn't get sick from it or anything. Weird. But my metabolism would never forrgive me if I kept this up. No more. The Seven slice at a time binge is no more.

The whole advertising idea is great. I just linked on it. Do you think anyone would be interested in reaching my 3 regular viewers?

I just listened to the trailer for the movie. It seems like it would be a great movie to advertise if the main characters were a stiff attorney and a prison escapee like "Bringing Down the House". It's the same idea. I wouldn't worry, the whole movie is a comedy and hopefully noone will take it too seriously.

Ezzie, one of my coworkers just bought a box of those Entenmann's crumb-topped doughnuts...and it's supposed to be her lunch and dinner. I was shocked, but mostly because she's a girl and most girls wouldn't eat a whole box of doughnuts!

I'm impressed that you're "not going to do it again" in the future.I actually did click on the ad's link when it was posted...and was suprised.(It didnt sound like the gal was becoming frum or anything close to that... :(

I also thought for a minute about allowing the ad, for what it's worth. The line about "the insanity that ensues when a Jewish daughter brings home her new Palestinian boyfriend" gave me some pause as well. Oh well. Throw back a few Momopolitans and it'll aaaaaallll look better...

A nymphomaniac. A little girl and a nymphomaniac. Didn't mean to suggest that the little girl is a nymphomaniac, although in a few years, who knows? What on earth is that little red outfit she's wearing? And boots? This is normal? This is wholesome?

For some reason, your ad reminds me of a time some years ago when I was working in an office with a cute, single Jewish office manager. She was sharing an apartment with a cute, single, Jewish girl from Israel.

One day, a cute boy with curly hair, a nice Jewish face, and what I heard as an Israeli accent, showed up to show everyone how to use the new copier. I followed him into the conference room with my mind working on how to find out if he was single, and thinking he might be Syrian, because he looked like a Syrian guy I met through Hillel once. I was working out some pretty advanced shidduch techniques in my head as we went around the circle, giving our names.

"What's YOUR name?" one of us asked, as he prepared to train us to make photocopies. "Oh, sorry. I'm Ali," he said.

That deflating sound? That was the noise of my idea that his mother would be happy I was setting him up with a Jewish girl collapsing.